Running A Business Is Tough!

5/10/2021 (Permalink)

Let’s face it, running a business is tough, and unless your business is disaster cleanup and restoration, handling a water loss, fire damage, mold remediation, or bio-hazardous cleanup is extremely stressful. If you know who to call, and how the steps take place, it’s much less frightening. For all the business owners out there, you got this! You have made it through a tremendously difficult year. Here are some steps to take if a disaster ever strikes your business or place of work.

-Step 1: Make the Emergency calls. If needed, call the fire department, police station, or ambulance. If nothing is currently on fire and no one is hurt or in immediate danger, you can move on to the next step.

-Step 2: Check to see how you can contain the loss. If it’s a water loss and water is pouring out of the dishwasher, shut off the water to the dishwasher, remove items from the path of water. If it’s a smoke damage after a kitchen fire, remove yourself from the structure if you do not have proper respiratory protective equipment. If you have the proper respiratory equipment and there is no further danger from the fire, you can remove any valuables from the business that you are afraid might get contaminated from the highly acidic smoke. If it’s mold, see if you can identify what is causing it to grow? But do not disturb it.

-Step 3: Call your insurance to get advice or file a claim if needed. Your insurance will most likely have a recommendation on a disaster cleanup company as well. It is important to note, that you can choose whoever you wish to do the work within your business or home. Your insurance does not determine who you hire, and it holds no bearing on how much coverage you will receive. A first call also might be straight to a local disaster cleanup team, such as SERVPRO of Salem West!

-Step 4: Walk through the loss with the disaster cleanup team and/or your insurance. This is important, and don’t try to guess what it going on within your structure, leave it up to the professionals to determine what caused the loss. Volunteering information that is a guess, or not been proven to be true, causes an approach very different than a fresh pair of eyes approaching the loss for the first time. If you can clearly see what caused the loss, communicate that. But don’t guess or assume anything.

If all 4 steps are done, it will be time to hire a disaster cleanup team and start the restoration process. If it’s covered, you will be filing a claim and be responsible for your deductible. The process is less scary the more educated you are on the steps it takes to get through the loss effectively.